Pawsey was elected as a Councillor for the Conservative Party for Dunchurch and Knightlow on the Rugby Borough Council in 2002. He served on planning, borough development and housing panels and was portfolio holder and cabinet member for Housing.

Pawsey resigned from his position as a councillor upon selection in January 2007 for the new parliamentary constituency of Rugby and was a member of the A-List.[5] Pawsey was first elected to the House of Commons in 2010 for Rugby with a majority of 6,000 votes.[6] He was subsequently reelected in 2015 and 2017 with majorities of 10,345 and 8,212.

Pawsey served on the Communities and Local Government Committee, having taken over from George Freeman, between 2010-2015.[7] He was also a member of the Public Bill Committee for the Defence Reform Act 2014[8] and has been a member of the all-party groups on manufacturing, microbusinesses, packaging, small business, sewers and sewerage and rugby union. He played for the Lords & Commons rugby club [9] and is currently also secretary of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Speedway Racing.
Since September 2017 he has been a member of the Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Committee.

Pawsey attracted controversy in December 2012 after he spoke out against allowing same sex people to marry by suggesting that it would lead to lower levels of heterosexual people getting married. He postulated: ""Given that marriage rates in Spain and Holland collapsed after the introduction of same-sex marriage, does she [Maria Miller] not fear that in this country even fewer couples intending to have children will choose to marry?" [12] Research later showed that Pawsley's evidence base for making his assertion was problematic.[13]

Since becoming an MP Pawsey has campaigned against various measures to limit the tobacco industry. In 2012 Pawsey set up, and became Chair, of the All Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) for the Packaging Manufacturing Industry, with one of objectives of this APPG is “to address issues facing the industry from regulation”.[14] Pawsey was one of the MPs who voted unsuccessfully against the proposed tobacco control measure of introducing plain packaging in 2015. Later that year, Pawsey was treated to hospitality worth £1,650 by Japan Tobacco International.[15] Having helped establish the APPG for E-Cigarettes, Pawsey promoted the alleged health benefits of e-cigarettes in Parliament, without disclosing that he had been treated to hospitality by a manufacturer of UK e-cigarette brand in December 2015.[16]

In July 2017, Pawsey was accused of hypocrisy by opponents after he voting against an opposition motion to end a below inflation public sector pay cap – one week after saying concerns over wages needed to be addressed in a letter to his local newspaper.[17]